Are you feeling the sugar high yet?

World demand for biofuels will expand at a nearly 20 percent annual pace to 92 million metric tons in 2011, despite recent concerns about the impact of biofuels on the environment and food supplies, according to Freedonia Research.
Market expansion will come from a more than doubling of the world market for bioethanol, and even faster increases in global biodiesel demand, Freedonia says in an Industry Study on World Biofuels through 2011. Other biofuels will also experience strong growth, though much slower than either biodiesel or bioethanol.
On a regional basis, growth will be driven by a rapid expansion of the biofuel market in North America, particularly for bioethanol. The Asia/Pacific region and Western Europe will experience even faster advances, although absolute gains will trail the larger North American market. Similarly, increases in the small Africa/Mideast and Eastern Europe markets will be well above average. Growth in Latin America will be modest, a consequence of Brazil’s already sizable market for bioethanol.
Despite the growing size of the world’s largest producers, the proliferation of new companies and rapid expansion of the biofuel industry overall combined to limit the top nine producers to just a 30 percent share of the market in 2006.
Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM)[U.S.] was the market leader, followed by POET [U.S.], Cosan (CZZ)[Brazil], Sofiproteol [Diester Industrie –France], VeraSun Energy (VSE)[U.S.], Santelisa Vale Bioenergia [Brazil], Abengoa [Spain], VERBIO Vereinigte BioEnergie [Germany] and Cargill [U.S.].
In conclusion, Brazil’s Costan (CZZ) sugar cane ethanol is 8 times as efficient as America’s corn ethanol, as well as 45% cheaper than OIL. Additionally, it only costs $100 dollars to adjust a current car’s engine to attain the ability to run on sugar ethanol. Get in on tomorrow’s monster stock while you still have time

2010: D-Day for the internet?

It is 11:50pm, and I’m casually making my way to the Yahoo sports page when I randomly stumble by this article on the front page news section. Could this be real?

Doom-filled warnings arrive from AT&T this week. The company says that without substantial investment in network infrastructure, the Internet will essentially run out of bandwidth in just two short years.Blame broadband, says AT&T. Decades of dealing with the trickle of bandwidth consumed by voice and dialup modems left AT&T twiddling its thumbs. The massive rise of DSL and cable modem service in the 2000s has had AT&T facing a monstrous increase in the volume of data transmissions. And that’s set to increase another 50 times between now and 2015. That’s enough, says AT&T, to all but crash the system.

In response, AT&T says it’s investing $19 billion to upgrade the backbone of the Internet, the routers, servers, and connections where the bulk of traffic is processed.

Of course, AT&T is using this breathlessness in part to point fingers beyond simple broadband use. Web video (especially high-definition video) is the most commonly mentioned bandwidth hog. AT&T says video alone will eat up 80 percent of traffic in two years vs. just 30 percent now. One wonders how YouTube doesn’t collapse under the pressure. Hmmm.

Meanwhile, many are wondering whether this is prelude to AT&T announcing (or not announcing, but doing anyway) a traffic prioritization/shaping system like Comcast has been tinkering with… and which has earned it nothing but scorn. Net neutrality (which would forbid premium pricing for certain Internet applications and destinations) is a topic that continues to be hotly debated on Capitol Hill, and telcos are anxious to kill the idea since they’d love to be able to charge additional money for different kinds of web traffic. If the whole Internet is about to crash, well, that makes AT&T’s argument all the more compelling, doesn’t it?

A "double-edged" time for investing

The US Federal Reserve has kept the benchmark federal funds rate unchanged at 2 percent. Holding interest rates steady, the FOMC (Federal Open Market Committee)focused more on the growing risk of inflation. The FOMC statement said – “Although downside risks to growth remain, they appear to have diminished somewhat, and the upside risks to inflation and inflation expectations have increased.”
It was the first time the Fed has held rates steady at a policy-setting session since embarking on a series of rate reductions in September.
The Fed also said – “The Committee expects inflation to moderate later this year and next year. However, in light of the continued increases in the prices of energy and some other commodities and the elevated state of some indicators of inflation expectations, uncertainty about the inflation outlook remains high.”
Warren Buffet, Chairman & CEO, Berkshire Hathaway said, “I think inflation is really picking up. So I think the Fed has to be very careful before they do anything that signals that they regard inflation as a secondary thing; that they will worry about later. It’s huge right now, whether it is steel, oil - you name it; the pressure you’ve seen in chemical prices recently with what Dow’s announced -you see it in every place.”On the dollar, Buffet said, “Over time, if we keep doing what we are doing and it isn’t the Fed - it starts with policy makers and Congress; if we keep doing what we are doing, we are going to get the same result, which is the weakening dollar in terms of running huge current account deficits. And part of that stems from oil. A lot of things go into that. But it is true that we can’t send USD 2 billion a day out to the rest of the world and not expect the dollar to go weaker over time. That’s not a short-term forecast. That’s going to happen over time.”
Eric Ross, Canaccord Adams, said, “The Fed is actually admitting in a lot of language that it used yesterday that it is in a tough place. It knows that the economy is going to get tougher, that inflation is really a big concern for the world, that even if oil comes down, they are still looking for other sorts of inflation food inflation, housing bubble; that they are going to have to work against.”
James Bianco, Bianco Research said, “I was a little disappointed by the wording. I was expecting something a little more definitive about raising interest rates. My fear is, we talk about oil speculation - these speculators in oil are being inspired by an East Fed and if the Fed wants to stay easy, if the Fed wants to find reasons to stall off the eventual raise in rates, we’re going to continue to see oil go higher. When they cut 25bps in January price of crude oil was USD85 per barrel, USD50 higher now - we risk the price going a lot higher unless they do something to curb these inflation expectations.”
According to John Kattar of Eastern Investment Advisors, Fed decision of not hiking the rates was right, given the continuing weakness in the banking sector. He feels that fed’s decision get frequently reversed. He has a positive outlook on stocks. He said that it is hard to see how they could have moved on interest rates given the weakness in the economy. At the same time, he feels that they stepped up their rhetoric on inflation front, reaffirming their credentials, paving the way for rated down the road. He feels that inflation is the biggest problem, and they will ultimately raise rates, if not now.
Harvey Pitt, Former SEC (United States Securities and Exchange Commission) Chairman said, “When you have bad economic times it prompts people to make bad decisions, and that can lead to violations of law. So, there may be an increase in the amount of misconduct that’s going on because of the economic conditions.”
July to August may prove to be one of the most important time periods within recent memory; The stock market’s economic stabilizers will be hard at work to prevent another market crash. As investors and analysts alike continue to offer opinions on the outlook of the US economy, only one thing is for certain: time will tell who will win this war — the sword (USD) with a final blow to the market, or a knockout by the Fed, government and investors coming together and once again turning the hills ahead into greener pastures.

Banks cringe in fear over mounting credit crisis

Stock prices plunged on Wall Street yesterday as a fresh wave of anxiety swept across the markets over the banking industry’s struggle with the mounting credit crisis.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average slumped by 360 points to 13,300 - its fifth worst day of the year. It was second drop of more than 300 points in a week.
General Motors’ record loss contributed to the gloom, as did forecasts of a potential $6bn (£2.8bn) write-off of bad debts at Morgan Stanley.
Investors are becoming increasingly nervous about the extent of financial institutions’ exposure to complex mortgage-related credit instruments which have become almost impossible to sell since thousands of homeowners began defaulting on mortgage repayments over the summer.
New York state’s attorney general, Andrew Cuomo, heightened alarm about the health of the banking sector by widening an investigation into alleged collusion to support house prices.
America’s largest savings and loan association Washington Mutual, which is at the centre of the inquiry, led the stock market down as its shares collapsed by 17%.
“Today was just not a great day to get out of bed if you’re an equity trader,” Liam Dalton, chief executive of Axiom Capital Management in New York, told Bloomberg News.
America’s banking shares fell by an average of 5.35% - the biggest one-day drop ever recorded. Morgan Stanley’s shares dropped by 6%, Lehman Brothers was down by 5.7%, Goldman Sachs slipped by 4% and Merrill Lynch lost 4.2%.
David Darst, chief investment strategist at Morgan Stanley’s global investment group, said: “The financials are the bodyguards of the market and when the bodyguards are taking shots then the market can’t do well.”
Broader stock market indices followed a similar pattern. The hi-tech Nasdaq exchange dropped by 2.7%, its worst outcome since February. The Standard & Poor’s 500 fell by 44 points to 1,475. Declines on the New York Stock Exchange were sufficient for the implementation of trading curbs, designed to calm volatility.
The number of falling shares outstripped rising prices by a margin of ten-to-one. Concern about corporate earnings has been aggravated by a continuing upward march in the price of oil, which has come close to $100 a barrel this week.
Credit market turmoil has led to the departure of two of Wall Street’s biggest names in recent weeks - Citigroup’s former boss Charles Prince and Merrill Lynch’s Stan O’Neal.
Citigroup’s former boss and his fellow executives were hit with a lawsuit filed in Manhattan yesterday by shareholders accusing them of “reckless actions” in spending “billions of dollars purchasing sub-prime loans”.
It is my opinion that July and August will be key months that will make or break the market. Keep a keen eye on the Dow Jones, and be very wary of its movements (tracking its week’s price highs and lows). I myself, much like the rest of Wall Street and Bay Street have been patient and remain relatively optimistic on the future outlook. Why? Well… lets hope for all our sakes that the Feds have learned from the 1990’s stock market crash, because if they haven’t — I don’t think we’ll be celebrating Christmas this year.

Add a little power to your dollar.

Are stock trading commissions eating away at your profits (or increasing your losses)? Ticked off at paying at least $29/trade at one of the big bank discount brokerages? Well there are some new players in town! They are MUCH cheaper and offer similar features. Who are we talking about? From my research, there are 3 major (cheap) discount brokerages in Canada that are worth mentioning which include: E-Trade, Interactive Brokers, and Questrade.
If you are looking for an RRSP account to invest in mutual funds, then you have 3 options, big bank, E-Trade, or Questrade.
If you’re looking for an RRSP account (with little interest in mutual funds) that has no fees, low minimum deposit, low commissions and you trade less than 790 shares at a time and LESS THAN 50 trades/year, then Questrade is your best bet.

I myself use QuestTrade and absolutely love it! $4.95 commission on every trade, with no monthly fees? Who wouldn’t fall head over heels with this deal. The only draw back is the required 3 passwords to access 3 different sections of the trading platform, but come on… when you are saving roughly $100 dollars per month this is hardly a legitimate complaint.


If you’re looking for an RRSP account but with a larger balance and typically trade greater than 790 shares at a time and MORE THAN 50 trades/year, then CIBC Investors Edge is best.
If you’re looking for a non-registered trading account with ridiculously low commissions and margin interest, then Interactive Brokers is a no brainer. There is a $10USD / month minimum fee with IB which means that if you spend less than $10USD in commissions in a month, they will charge the difference to your account. For example, if you spend $6 USD (6 USD trades) in commissions in a month, they will charge you an extra $4 USD. These monthly fees are tax deductible. IB also offers extremely cheap currency exchange. The biggest downside of IB is that you have to pay for your real time data.

Alot of people are making the mistake of jumping on the easiest rather than the best option available when choosing a discount brokerage (i.e. their banks). Don’t be fooled! Ironically, when I first took my investments step I signed up with my bank because it seemed like the easiest thing to do. They kept asking and throwing out smiles at you like a shark stalking its prey — The fact of the matter is that they offer no differences from Questtrade or Etrade.

When it comes to finding out what best fits your needs: be patient, learn, and do your research before you jump in head first. Take the opportunity of having the endless power of information at your fingertips: The Internet.